Snow Days
by Ms. Comfrey
Summary: Will woke up to find snow on the ground, hardly an odd occurrence in Araluen, the odd part followed later… And he'll learn never to oversleep again!


**Disclaimer: I do not own Ranger's Apprentice. I am not making money from this endeavor.**

 **Cabin in the Woods:**

Will woke with a start. He was late!

Hurriedly, he rolled out of bed, dressed as quickly as he could, and raced into the kitchen to find Halt sitting there reading some reports.

Halt looked up as Will dashed in.

"Here I was thinking you were going to sleep all day," said Halt.

"I'm sorry, Halt," said Will, contritely.

"Well, what are you waiting for, go do your chores and then I want you to make ten snowmen, position them around the field, behind trees, wherever you want. Come back when you've finished," said Halt.

Will nodded, heading to the door.

"Chores and ten snowmen, got it," he said.

Wait, Halt was asking him to make ten snowmen? He stopped and turned to Halt slowly.

"Ten snowmen, Halt?" he asked, uncertainly.

"Wasn't that what I said?" Halt countered.

"Just making sure," said Will, hastily.

Halt rolled his eyes and opened his mouth to say something, but Will dashed out the door before he could. Quickly, he fed the horses, drew the water, cleaned the dishes, chopped wood, and swept before ducking inside to grab his weapons.

"Are you done yet?" asked Halt as Will walked in.

"Not yet, Halt, I need to practice and then build your snowmen," replied Will.

"Build the snowmen first and I do believe that they will be your snowmen, seeing as you are the one making them," replied Halt.

"Yes, Halt," replied Will. He hesitated, then asked, "Why do I need to build ten snowmen?"

Halt turned back to his papers, "I expect you to be done with all of them in two hours."

"Two hours? Halt I can't do that in two hours!" cried Will.

"Make that one hour," said Halt, pitilessly.

Will left quickly.

The next hour saw him running around the field, rolling up snow, making faces, putting on a hats, scarves, and arms. At the end of the hour, he only had nine and two thirds of the tenth. As he was rolling up the top piece, Halt came out to inspect them.

"You only made nine," he said, flatly.

Will opened his mouth to argue, but a glare from Halt made him close his mouth quickly.

"When I come out next time, I want fifteen," Halt said. He turned and went back into the cabin.

Grumbling to himself, Will hurried to finish the snowmen, but before he could finish, Halt came out again and asked for twenty. The next time, he asked for twenty-five and then thirty.

When Will finally finished the required snowmen hours later, he had about fifty snowmen, all hidden around the field, behind trees, on the nearby stream, behind bushes, and anywhere else imaginable.

Halt nodded, "Not bad, now go get your weapons and Tug and shoot them."

Will, who had slumped in relief at the first two words, looked at him in horror.

"What?" he cried, "I've worked hours on them!"

"Well, if you wanted to keep these, you could always make more tomorrow. Come to think about it, there really aren't that many, especially for stationary targets…" Halt trailed off, pretending to think about it.

"No, no, I'll shoot them, I'll shoot them!" said Will, quickly.

Dashing inside, he grabbed his bow and knives, tacked Tug, and hurried back to where Halt was waiting.

"Five minutes," said Halt curtly.

"I can't do-" began Will.

"Five minutes or you do this again tomorrow," Halt interrupted him.

Will stared at him in horror, "What will I do about arrows?" he asked.

"Not my problem," Halt replied.

"Well? What are you waiting for?" asked Halt.

Will swung into the saddle and quickly began to shoot.

Arrow after arrow he shot, pulling them out of the snowmen as he went by. When he shot the last one, he looked at Halt triumphantly.

"Four and a half minutes!" he crowed.

Halt nodded at him, "Don't oversleep again."

With that, he turned and went back inside the cabin, calling over his shoulder, "I got some rabbits this morning while you were sleeping, we need to get supper going!"


End file.
